Matt Short launches Strikers into BBL finals, ends Stars' hopes

Adelaide Strikers captain Matt Short steered his side to the BBL finals with a quality innings to down the Sydney Thunder. In fixing a spot in the main four, Short clubbed a splendid 74 not out as Strikers pursued Thunder's 140 with nine wickets and 23 balls in excess at Manuka Oval on Sunday night. They'll confront Perth Scorchers or the Sydney Sixers in a disposal last and they take some serious structure there, having dominated four straight matches. Legspinner Lloyd Pope (4-22) and fast Jamie Overton (3-26) drove areas of strength for a night for Strikers, with customary wicket-taking guaranteeing Thunder couldn't get set in a faltering innings. In examination, Short looked relentless from the second he stepped into the center, rapidly showing the kind of structure that is seen him crush six half-hundreds of years in nine innings. Such was Short's strength, he kept two huge sixes out of the Manuka Oval area, while No. 3 Jake Weatherald was in comparative touch with four sixes in his unbeaten 47. The situation might have been different for Roar, with David Warner dropping a troublesome catch presented by Short off the main chunk of the innings. Short lauded his group's capacity to hit their lashes at the sharp finish of the opposition. "We made it quite hard for ourselves the last couple of games clearly dominating the last four or five to keep our expectations alive," he told journalists. "Exceptionally content with the young men, we hit structure brilliantly and I'm anticipating one week from now. We were at the lower part of the stepping stool at some stage there, to turn that around and get the successes and make the finals, it's a genuine credit to the young men." Short's surprising batting structure, which has procured him a hit up to the Australian ODI side, makes certain to be a secret weapon for Strikers in finals. "I've generally placed a major accentuation on beginning the competition well, getting a touch of energy right off the bat and moving through, which I figure I did pretty well," he said. "The test was to support what I haven't over the most recent few years, I've completed competitions pretty inadequately. I'm really glad for having the option to happen with the competition and the beginning I had." Batting first, Thunder opener Alex Hales hoped to remove the game from the Strikers, yet legspinner Cameron Boyce delivered an ideal leg-break that acquired an edge to turn the match on its head. Commitments lower down the request from captain Chris Green and Matt Gilkes assisted the Roar with building a to some degree good score, before they were bowled out with four balls in excess. Top-request players Warner, Cameron Bancroft and Ollie Davies generally fell inexpensively. Spinner Pope did his part in tidying up Thunder's tail, remembering bowling Green and Nathan McAndrew for sequential balls. He didn't get his full go-around however made due with the following best thing, pushing over Liam Hatcher a ball later.